Southern Blush

‘Ouch!’ I yelled after jamming my pinky toe into my dresser. Trying to get ready for a first date as a young woman is exciting and terrifying. It doesn’t help that being a southern young girl with a very large southern father was no doubt downstairs intimidating my poor date. I wasn’t allowed to date until I was sixteen and even then I needed a chaperone which looked like it was going to be daddy.

‘Sweetheart, do you need help?’ My mom asked through the door while gently tapping on it. ‘Yes, please,’ I begged her. I stood there in a crumpled dress that I couldn’t zip in the back, hair disheveled, slip showing, and hair knotted and sticking up. Chuckling, ‘Oh baby girl, let me help you,’ my mom said walking towards me. She whisked around me with such delicate grace I hadn’t noticed or felt her repair any of the damage I had clumsily done. She turned me around to look in the mirror and I looked older than my years.

My mother walked ahead of me downstairs, ‘Randy, she’s ready,’ she exclaimed to my father. She walked over and stood by him beaming. My father and my date stood. ‘Y…you look beautiful,’ my date stammered. I felt the heat in my cheeks. I remembered now why my mother said not to put too much blush on. My body was betraying me and putting on its own blush. My cheeks were now redder than the pink roses my date had for me. My father quietly said, ‘You look beautiful dear one. Shall we?’ he gestured towards the door.

My date quickly opened the door and held out his arm for me to hook mine through as we walked towards the car. Approvingly, my father opened the passenger side door for me to get in and tossed the keys to my date. ‘You remember what I told you if she isn’t returned in the exact same condition she left in, smiles and all.’ My date interrupted, ‘Yes sir, exact same condition.’ My dad knelt down and patted me on the knee, ‘You deserve everything in this world. Have fun.’ ‘Thank you, daddy,’ I replied watching him close the door with the blush on my face was soon replaced with a streaming tear. ‘Love you,’ I whispered watching him watch us drive away.

My first date didn’t go like this-like my father would have wanted but him cleaning his guns and knives on the table was a close second. Well, for him I guess. Fun fact my father was a large southern man and worked in the oil field. He taught me hard work and dedication will get me far in life. The only time that truly blushed was the night my father said I looked breathtaking-it was the night of my first homecoming. This is a trying response to The Post’s Word Prompt: Blush.